Apocalypse Slaves Pt. 11

Last week he took all of my money, and it may sound funny,

but I came to get my money back."

-Jim Croce, "You Don't Mess Around With Jim" (1972)

*

CHAPTER 110: The Hit Goes Out

"BOSS!" Davin yelled as he tore into the Shooter's Bar, Grill, and Pool Hall that Jim and the rest of the crew liked to relax and unwind at after hours. In his corner booth in the back, with his back to the wall, Jim glared at his truck crew lead for interrupting him while he was in the middle of a blowjob from Elsa, who was dutifully sucking him off under the table.

"This had better be good, boy," Jim told Davin as he shooed Elsa away and tucked his cock back into his pants. She scrambled from under the table to retreat to the nearby bench at the side of the room. "I just got her trained after a month to deep throat me and we was just gettin' into it," he grumbled. The other guys at the table likewise did the same with their girls, telling them to wait close by. Out of all of the girls that they'd taken from the Bunker a month ago, only Davin's girl had been confirmed pregnant so far.

"Corning got leveled!" Davin panted, having ran all the way here from where he'd heard the news. "The Crusaders have been wiped out!"

Jim's face turned from shock to disbelief as he sat bolt upright. Around him, everyone stopped what they were doing and went silent as all eyes were on Davin. "What? How?" Jim demanded. There were plenty of rival gangs in the area but none of them were strong enough to take on the Crusaders by themselves and he hadn't heard of them banding together.

"Caine... he's back." Davin breathed in wide-eyed fright. He pulled out a vidscreen and tapped the button. "Our spy got this out to us. This happened two days ago." It was a bit grainy and the image was jostled about in a hurry. But they watched as the man, the myth, and the legend himself interrupted a public disciplinary session that the Crusaders were famous for by gunning down their top three and before giving the crowd a spiel. Then they watched as he gunned down a few more Crusaders, marched calmly to the stage, gunned down a few more, and then said something that was lost in the background noise while he pointed out to the crowd. Then, to Jim's amazement, Crusaders in the crowd drew their knives and committed suicide as others rushed in to place them all under arrest.

"Who are these other guys with this... Caine?" Jim asked dubiously, not believing for a moment that this was the actual Caine. He'd been gone for years and to just suddenly show back up like this? Something wasn't right.

"The Lincoln Scouts," Davin reported.

"Shit... they're back in action too?" Jim groaned. "Fuck my everloving life..." He looked at Davin. "Did our boy say what he's after?"

Davin's eyes flicked over to where Elsa, Zoe and a few of the girls . "Everyone from the Lincoln Vault. The Crusaders were the closest so he hit them and the K.C. Hab first."

Jim frowned. "Why the K.C. Hab?" he asked with growing concern in his gut.

Davin shrugged, "All I heard is that he assassinated some high-level exec down there, making off with his wife and daughter."

"Fuuuuck..." Jim groaned, rubbing his hands over his smooth head as he thought. "Alright, keep on this guy thinking that he's Caine and let me know everything that he does. If they get a chance, kill him."

*

Things were quiet for some time until eight months later. Elsa, now nice and pregnant thanks to Jim's non-stop fucking, was wiping down tables at the Shooter's Bar, Grill and Pool Hall that was frequented by the 42nd Street Shooters when they were off hours. After earning her Master's trust, Big Jim had got her and Zoey both a job for when the Shooters were all out on missions into the wastes. Their attire had increased from 'totally nude' to semi-nude; wearing a frilly apron over top of her bulging belly with matching white slippers. Much to their surprise, none of the patrons accosted them. Just Big Jim and Isiah's names alone were enough to keep people from getting too cozy with the slave girls. Melissa frequented the joint whenever she came in with Davin and had been regulated to maid duties within the Shooters' apartments while they were away. But lately she'd just been cooling her heels at home as she was about to pop with Davin's child any day now.

It was an unspoken rule in this part of town that you didn't mess around with Jim or any of the Shooters.

She settled into a routine of keeping the house clean and running to the local market for her master. When he was in town, she made meals for him. When he was out of town, which was a lot, she was working at the Bar, waddling around attending tables and cleaning the place up with Zoey. Today was a day just like any other with the exception that there was a new man in the bar and he was staring intently at her. He wasn't a regular but he dressed just a little... off. Shrugging the feeling of unease off, she grabbed a menu and walked over to the corner table where he sat with his back to the wall. "Hello sir, welcome to Shooter's," she said happily as she placed the menu down on the table. "What can I get for you?"

The man pushed the menu back to her, politely folding his hands on the table. "What I want is not on the menu," he said with a cordial smile. Elsa shivered under his piercing gaze in those steel eyes of his. Something was off and her suspicions were confirmed when he said his next words. "What I want is your owner. Here. Now. I want Big Jim in here to meet with me, if you please."

*

Minutes later, Big Jim was stalking through the door of the bar, glaring daggers at the strange white man who was calmly sitting in the center table, HIS table, as if he owned the place. "Who the fuck are you, white boy?" he thundered, "and why the fuck are you sitting at my private table?"

"I'm just some guy that you managed to piss off, 'Big Jim'," the man snapped back, using Big Jim's name in air quotations with his hands. "Tell me; do they call you that because of your Johnson, your large size, or the amount of stupidity you seem to have in that little fucking head of yours?"

"Alright, White Boy," Jim growled at the strange, goateed stranger as many of the Shooters started piling in around the table. "You must have some kind of death wish for coming in here. But... seeing as the Gov doesn't look to fondly on outright murders here in Chi-Town, I'll make it sporting for you. You got exactly to the count of three to get the fuck outta here before I mop the floor with you." He leaned over the table held up a single finger in the man's face. "Onnnnne..."

"Two. Three!" the man counted off quickly, holding up his own fingers at each count, before standing suddenly and flipping the table up into Jim's face. At the same time he snagged a glass mug out of the air as it went flying up, sending it through the air to his right to take out Isaiah, hitting him square in the face. Isaiah fell backwards, hitting the floor hard. He then lashed out with a side step and a high kick, knocking Davin to the floor. Women screamed and scrambled for cover. Jim stumbled backwards in the face of the table flying up at him. The white boy moved wickedly fast as if he were possessed by a demon. He darted left and had Jason leveled before the man knew what had hit him. Jax then went at him with a savage right hook. White Boy ducked low and to the right, going with the punch. At the same time his right foot came whipping around to catch Jax in the side of the head, knocking him flat. Davin had got back up and tried a bear tackle but the boy just did a backwards cartwheel, catching Davin under the chin twice as he kicked with his legs while he went backwards. Davin's eyes glazed over as he went down for the count.

One by one, the Shooters went down as White Boy systematically took them all out. Jim tried one last time to get up only to have the man kick him savagely in his sternum. Jim went back down to the floor, clutching his chest as he wheezed for air. "Who the fuck are you?" Jim asked, exasperated, looking up at him.

The White Boy's lips twitched as if he were sharing a private joke with Jim. He stroked his black goatee as he leaned in close to Jim's face and spoke. "I'm the man who you pissed off. I'm the man who you put a hit out on." He grabbed Jim by the collar of his suit, pulling his face up as the white boy lowered his so that they were scant inches from each other's noses. "I... am Caine."

***

CHAPTER 111: Caine

"Hol-lee fuck..." Jim gasped, paling visibly as Caine dropped him to the floor. "You're real... I mean you're really fucking real!" His mind reeled at this development.

"Last I checked, asshole," Caine growled at him. "Now. Enough about me. Let's talk about you," he said, his tone turning casual. He kicked Jim down and then sat on his barrel chest, Caine reached back to where Jim's right pant leg came up. He took out the exposed revolver and held it up, inspecting it. "Hm... they say that you can tell a lot about a man from the type of gun he has. In this case a Smith and Wesson Six-Eighty-Six double action revolver... Six round cylinder... Thirty-Eight special rounds... What, do you think you're in the fucking old west or something?" Caine popped the cylinder and dropped all but one bullet out as he talked, the bullets dropping one at a time onto Jim' forehead, making him flinch each time. Caine then spun the cylinder and quickly snapped it back into place with a flick of his wrist. He looked down. "Now, let's talk philosophy... I like philosophy as I got a lot of philosophical questions. Questions like... is there a God?" He pointed the gun down, pressing the barrel into the center of Jim's head and cocking the hammer back. "Shall we find out?"

"Look... Caine... buddy..." Jim said, now visibly sweating, trying to give him a pained smile despite having the pistol pointed at him. "We can come to an arrangement, man..."

"I'm afraid that time has come and gone, my friend," Caine said, pulling the trigger. There was a loud click as the hammer dropped into an empty cylinder. Jim flinched with the click, expecting to have his brains blown out. All around him, the Shooters that were still conscious were likewise flinching. "Well, you get to proceed to the next round," Caine said, bringing the revolver back up, popping the cylinder, spinning it again, and snapping it back into place with a flick of his wrist. Jim was sweating now and breathing hard at the fact that he wasn't dead yet. Caine pressed the barrel back up against his forehead. "I'm now interested in current events. Why'd you put a hit out on me? What the fuck did I ever do to you? Huh?" he demanded, pulling the hammer back.

"What the fuck would you have done, man?" Jim shouted up at him. "You were going around 'saving' everyone from that damn vault," he yelled, putting a sarcastic lit on the term 'saving'. "You would've came up here eventually looking for our load!"

"Well you could've fucking asked me, for starters," Caine snarled right back at him, pulling the trigger. Click. "Damn you're fucking lucky today..." he quipped as he brought the revolver back up, spinning the barrel again. He looked at Jim and pointed the revolver back at him. "Or did you just not think that the actual Caine was going around, hm?" He cocked the hammer. "Come on, be honest now."

"Alright! I didn't think you were real! Okay? But I fucking believe that you're back now!" Jim said in a near panic, not sure if he'd survive a third pull of the trigger. Which was true. No one else short of Caine could come in and kick their teeth in like this. "Please, man, come on, don't do this! Don't kill me with my own fucking gun! If you're going to kill me, at least be a man about it and kill me with one of those fucking ray guns of yours that everyone talks about! Or snap my neck, or something!"

"Strong words from a piece of shit who doesn't have the fucking balls to fight me face to face. No... instead you have to send a gang of goons to jump me." Caine said darkly, his hand tightening around the trigger. "They're dead, by the way, I left their bodies to rot in the streets of Indianapolis Hab." The hammer was clicking back, ready to drop.

"NO!" Elsa screamed from the side of the room, moving with a speed that neither man would've thought possible with her being eight months pregnant. Both Caine and Jim looked at her with surprise as she charged over, pushing Caine by the shoulder to get him off of Jim before draping herself over his body protectively. "Please! Don't!" she was visibly crying while looking at Caine. "Please..." she begged the now confused looking Caine, "Please don't kill him." In that moment, Jim looked at his slave, and Caine for that matter, in a new light. Elsa weighted maybe a hundred pounds, dripping wet, and that included having the baby. Caine, on the other hand, was heavy enough to shrug her off, yet he held his fire, didn't shoot her, and had the decency to roll off of Jim when he got pushed. As Jim sat up, Elsa imposed her semi-nude body between him and Caine, staring the famed mercenary down with her beautiful, sparkling, tear stained green eyes. His heart all of a sudden was filled with warmth at Elsa coming to his defense and a respect for Caine for having the good grace to play along with her.

"What the fuck is it with all these women being protective of the men who kidnapped them out of the vault?" Caine asked, rolling his eyes and dramatically looking to the heavens beseechingly. He got up off of the floor and stalked over to Jim and Elsa. His attention went to Elsa. "Does he treat you right?" he asked, pointing Jim's gun back up into his face.

Elsa paused, but nodded. "And he's the father of my baby..." she added with tears in her eyes and a quivering lip as she rubbed her very pregnant belly. "I've lost so much already and I've gotten used to things here. Please... don't take this away from me. Don't take him away from me. I... I can't handle losing everything again."

Caine cocked his head as he tried to figure her out. Then he pulled the trigger, making Jim and Elsa both flinch. Click. "Looks like it's your lucky day, Mister Big Jim Walker," he said, casually tossing the gun to him as he turned to walk for the door.

Jim caught it and pointed it right at him, aiming for the center of Caine's back. By his count any one of the next three cylinders had a live round in it. Now he imposed his body between Caine and Elsa protectively. "You got some fucking balls, boy, giving me my gun back with a live round left in it!" he thundered..

Caine stopped, turned, and smiled at him. Then he held up a single bullet between his thumb and forefinger. Then he flicked it across the room to Jim, who caught it and looked at it dumbfoundedly. "I never actually loaded it. I just wanted you to think that. Read into that what you will," he said before walking out the door whistling an upbeat tune from long ago. Jim opened the cylinder and saw that Caine had been right; his gun was indeed empty.

*

"Gov! We have a problem! Jim said as he stormed into the Governor's office. "Caine is..." he started to say and then stopped short when he saw said man sitting across from Governor Burris at the desk. Out of reflex, Jim pulled his revolver, now fully loaded, and pointed it right at Caine. The infamous outlaw himself was casually sipping tea while holding the saucer. "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING HERE?"

"You want to find out or are you just going to start shooting up the place?" Caine asked, calmly taking another sip of tea.

"Won't you join us?" Burris asked, gesturing to the empty seat next to Caine. "We have much to discuss." Glowering at them both and wondering what was going on, Jim holstered his weapon and cautiously sat down. His eyes darted between the two of them and he somehow managed to hold his tongue to allow the Governor to talk. "For starters," Burris said once Jim had sat down. "I want you to rescind the assassination order on Caine."

"Why?" Jim snapped, cutting off what Burris was going to say after that.

"Well, you COULD keep the order active," Caine said evenly, "but that'll just mean that I'll be putting more Shooters into the ground... which means all your girls will become mine to take."

"The hell they will!" Jim shot up out of his chair, making it tumble backwards in the process.

"That was not something that we were going to agree to!" Burris now shouted Caine's way.

"Who's gonna stop me?" Caine asked, nonplussed by the outbursts as he took another sip of tea. "I survived being jumped by your assassins in Indy. I walked into your Hab unchallenged and unmolested. I went straight to the headquarters of your best warriors and kicked their teeth in on their home turf," he put the teacup and saucer aside and stared them both down. "What the fuck do you think you can possibly do to stop me?" He smiled as they both calmed down, with Jim slowly going for his chair to sit back down. "Now, Big Jim, the assassination order?"

"I'll tell the boys to stand down." Jim said at last. He glared at Caine. "If nothing else to keep my boys alive."

Caine shrugged. "Whatever helps you sleep at night, bro." He looked back at Burris. "Now, on to item two; your slaves."

"Refugees," Burris corrected.

"Ya got a funny way of taking them in..." Caine countered. "Putting them in cages, transporting them across Hell's Half Acre, selling some of them to slavers and raiders. Yeah, y'all are slavers yourself. However!" he held up a single finger to forestall the next round of protests. "You have demonstrated that you take care of them, treat them well, and that, for the most part, they're given choices. Stop taking people by force and try to entice people here willingly."

"In exchange for what?" Jim asked.

"Me not killing you and putting someone in place who will do as I ask," Caine said flatly. "I'm sure my actions down in K.C. have made it up here. Corning is now written into the history books. I'm pretty sure me storming the White House and taking down Payne Pharmaceuticals will be trickling out here soon enough. So use your imagination as to what I can do here."

"You did WHAT?" Burris asked incredulously.

Caine grinned and rubbed his hands wolfishly. "Now, for the lucrative part of the deal. Lincoln is an up and coming little town. I've arranged with the United States to get Hab Wall and Hab Shield parts sent out to them. I also have a couple of ladies who want to start up a Dairy Farm there to help feed the children. I need construction materials shipped down to Lincoln to renovate a lot of old buildings, including an old hotel. I need machines for milking and fucking girls who are willingly going to be in the herd. And finally, I need plants, seed, and materials to make a greenhouse area in this building.

"Annnnd... what do we get for this?" Jim asked cautiously.

"You have an intact pre-Flare bunker under the city," Caine said flat out. "I found out about it when I was down in Indianapolis. I'll take you there, open it up for you, rummage around for what I'm looking for, and then you can have the rest that's inside. I'm sure that, in of itself, is well worth the price for all three of my requests." His mouth quirked in a smile when their jaws dropped open.

"Where?" Jim breathed, now in shock and awe. He thought that he'd gone through all of the old army locations and national guard locations in the city. They'd long since been picked clean, of course, but they were still fun to explore. Now, here Caine was telling them that they had one that they missed. If there was one, he wanted in it. There was always choice material, weapons, specs, you name it, down in the pre-Flare bunkers.

"Nuh-uh..." Caine shook his head. "Ship my order out first. Then I'll take you down there. We'll talk once I verify the shipment and I see the trucks heading out to Lincoln. Screw me, and I'll make sure that your last moments on Earth are very painful." He stood up. "Good evening, gentlemen," he said as he headed for the door.